This will be our first goal-setting week, and it's a good time to set session-long goals. How long is the session? Fourteen weeks, once again, so the final goal-setting week will be week 13 (10 August) and the reporting and rejoicing week will be 17 August. We'll have a midterm check-in on 6 July, week 7.
What do you want to rejoice about in the middle of August? That is, what accomplishment of yours shall we celebrate? Since it's summer (for those of us in the northern hemisphere, and in recent sessions that's been all of us [anyone Down Under want to join in? please do!]), I think some Fun Life Goals would be a good accompaniment to academic goals.
Our theme is food, so consider whether you want to have a starter, main course, and dessert, or a succession of small plates, or a buffet from which to pick and choose.
So, three things, this week, assuming you introduced yourself in week 1 (and if not, please go ahead and do that this time): session goals, goals for the coming week, and, if you like, a suggestion for a quick and tasty meal, maybe a one-pot wonder.
Oh, and here's the boilerplate from previous sessions about goals: Goals can be in any aspect of life, although the key focus is often writing tasks that are personally and professionally important but that never quite tip over into important AND urgent. Urgent things sometimes find their way in here too; that is completely okay, and process goals are also most welcome.
If you've been thinking for awhile about joining in, we'd love to have you try us out this time around!
I'll start with the meal suggestion, which is for a vaguely Asian noodle soup. This is adapted to my needs; other people might use different vegetables. Adjust amounts to reflect the number of people you're serving, and their tastes.
ReplyDeleteChop some ginger; put it in a pot with some salt, rice noodles, and either water or leftover vegetable-cooking water, or broth. Add sliced carrots and strips of collard greens. Bring to a boil and simmer as long as the noodles need to cook through. In the meantime, add to a large bowl a squirt of mustard, some brown sugar, lime juice, and toasted sesame oil to taste. Also some black pepper. If you have it, chop some cilantro and add that to the bowl. If you have cooked chicken, chop it into bite-size pieces and add that, too. If not, break an egg into the soup, and poach it, or beat it up and make egg-drop soup. Pour the soup pan contents into the bowl, stir vigorously, and serve.
Session goals: This was a bad sleep week and I have not made the lists I meant to. But I'm going to post the things that seem most important now, on the theory that they probably are the most important because I can remember them:
* write essay due at the start of September
* plan work for summer TA and do some supervising of her
* write and deliver two conference papers, focusing most energy on the one that will be the core of a book chapter
* plan classes for next year
* submit two course proposals
* swim 2-3 times a week
* yoga on the deck as often as possible
* work in the garden 3x/week
* do 5 Life Stuff tasks (there's an old list in my little Moleskine that is likely still to have a lot of undone tasks on it, sad to say, so I'll select from that)
This week's goals:
* prep food for 2-day symposium, go there, try to have a good time
* finish new raised bed and plant veg
* swim x2
* write 2x 1 hour
* scholarly reading/note-taking 2x 1 hour
* hang out with visiting friend next weekend
So sorry about the bad sleep week. But I'll be stealing your soup recipe!
DeleteI'll also start with the meal. I have a similar Asian style soup I love, with coconut and noodles and lots of lime. In fact, I'm making it on Tuesday! To serve up something different, I'll go with a tray bake that has always been a crowd pleaser so far:
ReplyDeleteCut up two red onions into quarters or eighths, depending how big the onions are. Scatter in an oven dish. Peel sweet potatoes and cut into chunks, add to dish. Add 1 tsp paprika, more if you like depending on quantities, a pinch of salt and some olive oil. Toss together. Place sausages (meat or vegetarian) on top, bake in oven for about 30-45 minutes, until sausages are cooked and sweet potatoes soft. Serve with broccoli or any other green veg.
Session goals:
1. Research & writing (this will be buffet style)
i) Revisions to article currently under review (assuming it will come back some time this session)
ii) Outline at least, write if possible, two different chapters I've been invited to contribute to edited volumes. Both mean revisiting old material, so I'm dragging my feet a bit here. One is also for a popular audience, so a different style of writing (cookery?) than I'm used to.
iii) Organise workshop in June
iv) Do some research on current project. Depending on outcome of grant application, work out priorities for next year.
Teaching
i) Get all marking done.
ii) Read final final drafts for one PhD student; wait to see if other student will ever send written work (this is heading for a car crash).
House
i) Big project for this session: getting the garden how I want it.
ii) Small jobs as and when time allows.
Fun stuff/self care
i) Exercise - improve fitness.
ii) Eat healthily - this session will either be great for this or terrible.
iii) Sleep!
iv) Continue reading for pleasure
v) Journaling, more creative stuff.
A lot of weekends will be taken up either with sports events for my son, or looking at universities with my daughter.
In terms of what I want to be celebrating in August: we'll have been on holiday by then, to Iceland, so that will hopefully have been a fun trip. I'd like to feel I've done enough research/writing to have been productive, but there are no big goals there. Otherwise, I'd like to have spent time in the improved garden, and to feel I have better habits with sleep/exercise etc.
Love your recipe, and sweet potatoes. I think the sheet pan recipes are so good, and so easy...
DeleteGood luck on the rest.
I do a very similar tray bake - also works well with other wintery root vegetables like carrots, parsnips, that sort of thing. Delicious!
DeleteThis week's goals:
ReplyDelete1. Finish marking exams (due Thursday)
2. Book travel for two workshops in June.
3. Finish assembling new patio furniture (unless it rains); buy new pots and plants for patio.
4. Prep for daughter's birthday party on Saturday.
Keeping goals minimal, as there are meetings this week that will eat up time, plus Friday I have to take a day to be in Nottingham at a regatta with my son.
Realised I also need to add a book review to session goals! And possibly a PhD thesis to examine.
new plants, that sounds great! May = meetings across the UK it seems...
DeleteHmmm. Recipes. I've done a version of Julie's bake with sweet peppers (multiple colors best) and cherry tomatoes. So I'll give you my endlessly flexible pasta recipe:
ReplyDeleteFor 8 oz pasta, rotini or penne, though anything works (regular, whole wheat, gluten free); while pasta cooks, saute about 2 stalks broccoli or 1 lb asparagus in olive oil, when almost done, add some garlic, then add 4-8 oz smoked salmon or peeled raw shrimp. It's great to toss in some white wine, but otherwise I use pasta water to add some liquid to the sauce. When everything is ready, toss together, add parmesan or romano to taste.
NB This is capable of infinite variations. My father did this with smoked salmon and broccoli, I've also done smoked salmon with asparagus, and sometimes shrimp and asparagus. It helps to have a crunchy green veg, but experiment. I'm sure you could use chicken breast... My brother occasionally adds cherry tomatoes to this, cooking them with the green veg. It's important to add the garlic relatively late in the cooking.
Anyway:
Session goals:
1. Get Famous Author out the door (goal June 1)
2. Write short essay about recent book, theoretically due June 1
3. Write keynote address for late June workshop, preferably before I fly to the UK on June 15
4. Start poking around in archives on new project
5. Have a good vacation with my sister in Paris and with friend
6. Start preparing my head for the fall and a return to teaching.
7. Keep up with some kind of exercise/ fitness
8. Enjoy myself - museums, theatre, etc.
9. Be sociable, try to meet people
Goals for this week:
1. Keep plugging away on Famous Author. With luck get everything just about done by Friday. Including asking for permissions.
2. Exercise
3. Enjoy myself in my last two weeks here.
Oh, and I forgot to add reading my students thesis chapters, which will be coming in. Probable defense at the end of June.
DeleteAs to what I'll celebrate in August? Being ready for my last year working?
Adding on thesis defenses is starting to look like a theme!
DeleteI love asparagus and with smoked salmon is a winning combination. Good luck with Famous Author, that will be a milestone to celebrate!
DeleteAdd some courgettes (zucchini) to those peppers and tomatos and you have something that approaches ratatouille - delicious!
DeleteCurrent favourite recipe is a bit wintry, but since it is freezing here today I’m making it anyway. It is a mung bean curry. Curry base is 4-8 cloves of garlic, turmeric, cardamom, cloves, and a bit of cinnamon, fry onions/leeks/celery/carrots/peppers (aka anything vegetable’ish that you have), add stock and can of crushed tomatoes, add as many beans as you have (3-4 cups dry works for lots of leftovers) and leave till they are soft. Simmer with lid off so liquid reduces to stew consistency. Before taking off add either sour cream or coconut milk, with spinach or other greens if you have, stir till warm/wilted, serve with lime juice.
ReplyDeleteWhat do I want to celebrate in August? A very good question… I want serious research progress and success with the students I have for the summer (2 graduate, 2 undergraduate). I also want some time off, more than just a few days here or there, and go kayaking at least a few times. I want time to work on my garden plans. I want to feel fit and healthy and relaxed.
Session goals:
Two new papers submitted
Revised course material for fall and winter
One defended graduate thesis
Good experience for 2 hired undergraduates
Kayaking
Exercise
Garden improvement
This week’s goals
Catch up from conference absence
Extensive journal tasks
Read and edit thesis chapters
Read and edit three student project proposals
Write outline of paper from conference talk
I think I have that recipe, or one that's very similar! Clearly this is the session for gardens!
DeleteHi. Late, again, sigh! And I don't think I introduced myself - JaneB, transitioning into late career I guess at a somewhat beleaguered regional university in Northern England, UK - we lost 6 colleagues over the last calendar year, are facing a new departmental structure starting 1st August (merger with a group with very different attitudes), and in general dealing with a lot of uncertainty. I'm dealing with annoying stupid health stuff (so far all niggly not properly serious, but that doesn't mean they don't steal energy and attention and "spoons") and neurodivergent burnout, and work tends to steal aaaall the energy. I am EXCESSIVELY grumpy at the moment (Spring is my "SAD season", my hayfever makes me want to scratch the inside of my skull, and nearly two weeks ago whilst attending a most unpleasant and pointless "Away Day" (on the other side of our campus, in a windowless room, with no coffee or lunch provided due to financial issues) I managed to somehow injure the heel/arch of my left foot which is currently the "good" leg with the less painful arthritic hip, and I'm still hobbling). But it is nearly summer...
ReplyDeleteFortunately I live alone apart from a feisty rescue cat - Shoutypants - who completely ignores my mards and moods - so I'm not inflicting it on anyone else!
This is going to be a summer with a lot of student stuff - I have a master's by research student doing field and lab work, a PhD student who is writing up to submit in September, two summer taught masters students doing projects, and a couple of keen undergrads who are planning to start their research projects this summer rather than waiting for autumn, and that's only my official responsibilities - I also do a fair bit of collaborating/mentoring of early career people at other universities/in other countries and a couple of them are also working towards publications/needing input. I've decided therefore that even though I have a lot of annual leave to use, I'm only taking three actual weeks off, and I'm using a chunk of the rest to work three day weeks (I don't usually work Friday - officially at least - as I'm now on a 70% contract - but I've also put in annual leave on most Mondays in June and July) so hopefully I'm not leaving students unsupported but I am getting more time for recovery and all that good stuff.
Recipe - another tray-bake, and not a very original one as it was short-internet-thing trendy a year or two ago! Get a packet of gnocchi, throw them on a baking tray or in a large shallow dish like a lasagne thing. Add a relatively quick to cook vegetable or two - for a summery one, chopped up courgette and baby tomatoes and peppers if you like them are good, or chunks of mushroom and onion - and toss with a bit of olive oil and paprika. Make a square space in the middle of the tray, add a whole block of feta cheese (you don't even need to wash it, just dump it there) and stick the lot in the oven for 20-25 minutes. Pull it out of the oven, add a couple tablespoons of pesto, toss it all together (any tomatoes will fall apart and turn into sauce), and eat - the gnocchi are crispy outside and fluffy inside, the feta makes a fresh tasting sauce, and the dish has a lot of variations and it reheats well (add a tablespoon of water before microwaving or oven-heating). You can use pesto as the olive oil, there are lots of pestos out there, and the two key ingredients of gnocchi and a block of feta keep in the fridge for a month or more so it's a very easy thing to have on hand just in case. it makes a complete meal, or is delicious alongside something like chicken or sausages or with a green salad.
Session goals: I need to sort those out! For me, it's not the end of trimester yet, that's officially next week (and marks from this trimester are due the Monday of the week after) so I'm keeping setting sessions goals as a goal for the week!
DeleteWEEKLY GOALS:
1) set session goals in personal and professional spheres
2) TRY to get caught up with feedback to graduate students on written stuff (four items to do - realistically I should manage two)
3) mark two pieces of undergrad work that had extensions
4) set up a new teaching notebook
5) do gentle stretching workout three times
6) DON'T do any work work at least two days at the weekend (I don't like Grumpy Me and a good way to buy her off is spending large chunks of time with a novel and a cat - and on the treats theme, I treated myself to a bottle of premium brand elderflower cordial so I'll be getting some sparkling water, making some ice cubes, and having a fancy beverage alongside)
I love that all our recipes are more or less a base with infinite variations. Use what you have or what you like! I must try the gnocchi recipe!
DeleteThat gnocchi recipe sounds amazing! And I love having a special drink as a weekly goal!
DeleteHello! I'm a week late, so I'm just posting my session goals here so that they don't get lost at midterm check-in etc.:
ReplyDelete1. Research/writing: Complete copy-edits of book, submit revised article, submit abstract for MK, start working (idly) on research for MK, read and review book
2. Creative: Finish green sweater, work on knit dress, make a book or two, other projects!!
3. House: Clear out storage area, fix basement doors that don't close properly, wash windows at some point
4. Family: Costa Rica album, anniversary book, vol. 2 of uncle's memoirs
5. Personal: Read Italian novel vol. 2, get outdoors as much as possible, lots of exercise
6. Misc. work: Update program website, prep new class
Argh this is heu mihi; I don't know why my ID doesn't save automatically any more!
Delete